“My daughter saw the man she loves this morning.”
“Then it must have been that sulphur waistcoat which puzzled you so, Latournelle,” said his wife. “The young man had a pretty white rose in his buttonhole.”
“Ah!” sighed the mother, “the sign of recognition.”
“And he also wore the ribbon of an officer of the Legion of honor. He is a charming young man. But we are all deceiving ourselves; Modeste never raised her veil, and her clothes were huddled on like a beggar-woman’s—”
“And she said she was ill,” cried the notary; “but she has taken off her mufflings and is just as well as she ever was.”
“It is incomprehensible!” said Dumay.
“Not at all,” said the notary; “it is now as clear as day.”
“My child,” said Madame Mignon to Modeste, as she came into the room, followed by Butscha, “did you see a well-dressed young man at church this morning, with a white rose in his button-hole?”
“I saw him,” said Butscha quickly, perceiving by everybody’s strained attention that Modeste was likely to fall into a trap. “It was Grindot, the famous architect, with whom the town is in treaty for the restoration of the church. He has just come from Paris, and I met him this morning examining the exterior as I was on my way to Sainte-Adresse.”
“Oh, an architect, was he? he puzzled me,” said Modeste, for whom Butscha had thus gained time to recover herself.